Passenger Seat
by Falco Conlon
Summary: [Newsie Challenge 1] David is not a leader. He tries to understand this. He’s not a people person. He thinks that perhaps that is it. That is why he is not a leader. And it is exactly why Jack Kelly is. AU.


_Brought to you by the song "Road" by Nick Drake._

--

When he kicks his feet up onto the dashboard he can no longer feel the thrumming of the car through his legs. David is not a leader. He is smart, brave and loyal, but he is not a leader. He tries to understand this, with his arm braced on the door and his hair tangled by the wind that is whipping through the open window. He's not a people person. He prefers small groups to large ones. He thinks that perhaps that is it. That is why he is not a leader.

And it is exactly why Jack Kelly is.

David runs his tongue over his teeth. They have that rough feeling one gets after eating too much candy. The sun is just setting and they are driving out to the point so they can make a bonfire, drink beer and enjoy the summer smell of ocean and seaweed.

He turns his head to look at Jack. He is laughing at something Spot said, but David did not hear what it was. Even when he thinks no one is looking, Jack smiles as though he is charming a crowd into following him. He's always smiled that way; at least, he has for as long as David has known him.

They met the first day of freshman year in high school. Jack convinced a football player why it would be a bad idea to beat David up. David cannot remember the specifics. He was too busy trying not to cry.

The radio is that perfect volume so that the music permeates everything, but no one needs to shout to be heard. The road is winding and Jack is probably driving too fast, but David just smiles and closes his eyes. It is the summer after their freshman year of college. Jack has become a national hero amongst college students for organizing a student strike in retaliation to the draft.

David doesn't tell anyone that Jack got the idea from him. He doesn't mind. It was one telephone conversation a month into school and a day after the draft was reinstituted. Jack hadn't seemed to care much. His draft number was high. So was David's.

"Apathy is dangerous, Jack," he'd said that night. Jack had been silent for a long moment.

"What would you do," he'd asked after the pause, "if you were me."

David closes his eyes and tilts his head to the side so the wind fills his nose. Everything smells green and lush. It's mid-June and the car is full of barely-out-of-adolescence boys. He told Jack what he would do and Jack did it, because Jack is David if he were Jack.

After Sarah and Jack broke up a week before he left for school, she and David got in a fight. She asked him if he ever resented Jack for being able to do all the things David couldn't. He'd had to think about it, but eventually said no.

In the seat behind him, Racetrack kicks his feet up onto David's headrest. He leans forward to look at David between the front seats as if expecting him to be upset, but David just reaches back and flicks Race's bare toe.

David knows that on the floor, where his feet would be if they weren't up on the dash, the Boston area newspaper that put Jack on its front page is lying crumpled. David is proud of him, proud that he executed it so well, proud that Jack found something to believe in. Jack has been quiet about the manner. He's been called with requests for interviews, but turned them down. David hasn't asked why.

He supposes, as he readjusts in his seat and Jack downshifts to ease the car around a particularly sharp curve, that Jack is startled by his own ardor for the topic. It was a sudden change of heart. The morning after they'd first spoken about the draft Jack had called again to tell David that the closest friend he'd made so far at school had already been called up. David hadn't pointed it out, but Jack had sounded almost close to tears. David knows from experience that going from apathy to passion that quickly is starting. Jack had it brought home for him, and Jack did something about it.

It is for that reason David lets Jack remain silent. Spot and Race are doing the talking, each yanking the other's chain. It is what they do best. David turns his head away from the window to crack an eye open and look at Jack. He is smiling, hands relaxed on the wheel as he brings them around one more curve.

"Hey," David says quietly, careful not to interrupt Race and Spot's banter so that he and Jack can have a certain level of privacy. "Your friend, the one who's been drafted. He alright?"

Jack glances down at him and downshifts again to pull into the dirt road that will take them to the beach. His smile doesn't falter. "He'll be just fine, Davey." He nodded, sounding very sure of himself. "We'll all look out for each other, right?"

David breathes summer deep into his lungs and closes his eyes again. "Yeah," he murmurs, "yeah, we'll look out for each other."

--

_For Keza, because the boys in this story are in Maine, and when I think of summer in Maine, I always think of you._


End file.
